"That was the best game we've played all year, against the best team we've seen, in my opinion," McNamara said following the Chieftains' 13-5 loss to Westboro at a chilly Chieftain Field. "We played our best against them. We were good early ... then McNamara took over."

The loss drops Nashoba to 0-6, while Westboro improves to 6-1.

The Chieftains had come out with a bit of extra intensity, keeping the Rangers off the scoreboard through the first six minutes. They even potted the opener, as Robert Braceland -- one of nine seniors on the squad -- bounced off a defender with his back to goal, spun and fired a doozy of a bouncer that had Westboro goalie Jeff Bernard beat.

"He needs to (assert his dominance on the wing)," McNamara said of Braceland. "He's got a great shot, he's big and physical. They sat in that zone today and didn't give us the shot."

Enter Trevor McNamara.

Westboro's slippery junior opened his account for the game with a score off a rebound, but that wouldn't be his last, as he added six more.

Still, Nashoba managed to keep things tight, as the Chieftains had two fewer shots (8-6) and three fewer on-target (6-3) than their guests. And while Charles Katz -- one of 17 seniors for the Rangers -- scored with 24 seconds remaining in the opening quarter, Nashoba still had a little oomph left.

Early in the second, an errant Westboro pass turned into a sweet goal for Nashoba's John Czekanski.

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Braceland scooped the ground ball as soon as the ball crossed into the Chieftain offensive half and motored forward. And after waiting for a little extra help and a few passes, Czekanski sneaked one in past Bernard for the equalizer with 10:27 left in the half.

That was, however, the closest Nashoba came, as the Rangers scored the next eight goals -- four of which came from McNamara -- to blow the game open.

Westboro's play on the ground balls as well as in the clamps did the job to keep the ball away from the Chieftains.

"We lost that matchup multiple times; a lot of that came off them winning more ground balls than us, and on the scramble out of there, we're not matched up strength on strength," McNamara said. "We have to be better; as a unit, we have to be better and come up with some of those ground balls.

"And we did at the end. We put Danny Cline on McNamara, who was doing a good job of coming up underneath us. We weren't taking a good enough angle on him. We really could have squeezed it; our angle was a little too high on him."

It wasn't until 1:40 remaining in the third, after Westboro had built a 10-2 lead, that Michael Czekanski, after stealing the ball and rushing forward some 40 or so yards, scored on a nifty second-chance opportunity.

The Czekanskis scored two goals apiece for the hosts.

"Michael's our captain, he's our leader," McNamara said. "He made the big play when he's stumbling and getting hit, and scores the goal to break their run. And when John's hot, John can score. It was nice to have him put them on cage today.

"If we can get that consistency out of him moving forward, we're talking our scoring depth going from 1-2 deep to 3-4 deep."

Despite the scoreline, Nashoba goalie Robby Atwood came up with big saves -- some at point-blank range -- which kept the visitors honest.

"Robby's keeping us in games. It was a five-goal game at halftime, and if we dig out of it and correct it, we'd be fine, because Robby's consistent," McNamara said.

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